Lick 9: Rusty Cooley style descending legato phrase

After playing our Bluesy influenced phrases in lick 8, we come to a lick which is the polar opposite stylistically and rhythmically. This is a descending legato phrase, which is very Satriani inspired, however, I feel in Mark Tremonti’s case it would have been more influenced by his admiration for Rusty Cooley’s playing. There are lots of notes in this lick, more than ever I would highly recommend checking the tab and the video for a more detailed explanation of the exact notes played. However, I can tell you that we are still using notes from the D Dorian scale using a 3 note per string pattern, and we are using legato technique exclusively. The lick is based around 3, 5 and 7 note legato rolls, for example, the first portion of the lick starts on the high E string and we ‘roll’ up and down 5 notes before moving onto the next string, which in this example is a roll of 7 notes etc. Be sure to practice this lick super slow at first, making sure all the hammer-ons and pull-offs are rhythmically even, and make sure each note is dynamically the same volume as the last note in order to create a smooth flowing phrase when played up to speed. One of the key aspects to nailing legato technique is relaxation and feeling the rhythm of the notes, good luck!

Lick 10: Bluesy phrasing part 3

After our monster legato run we arrive in the 3rd and final section of our solo. Our legato run enabled us to move into a higher position on the fretboard, and over the course of the solo we have been slowly building higher and higher which is creating a feeling of movement throughout the solo. We landed on the 17th fret A string in our legato run, we now come back to some Bluesy question and answer phrasing which once again mimics the rhythm guitars in the backing track before ascending up the D minor pentatonic scale using slides and some string skips which really help emphasize the feeling of upward movement due to the wider intervals created by the string skipping. We end this building phrase with a huge tone wide bend on the high E string before moving into our next classic Blues Rock lick.

Lick 11: 3 note per string pentatonic cyclic phrase

Here we have a phrase very similar to lick 2 at the start of our solo, once again it’s a cyclic pentatonic phrase this time on the high E string. We pick the first 3 notes on the 17th, 20th and 22nd frets before pull of back down the same notes to the 17th fret and then starting the short phrase again, we repeat this several times before ascending down a similarly performed phrase using notes from the D Blues scale. This lick ends when we hit the 19th fret G string and apply some very wide vibrato before move into our next Zakk Wylde style pentatonic speed lick.

Lick 12: Zakk Wylde descending 2 note per string pentatonics

This lick is a tough one to play at speed, so I highly recommend checking the tab and practicing this lick very slowly to start with. The general concept behind this Zakk Wylde style lick is to descend 6 notes of the D minor pentatonic before moving down a position and descending another 6 notes etc. Each phrase starts with a pull off on the G string before alternate picking the rest of the notes on D and A strings. Compared to our 3 note per string licks we encountered earlier in this solo, alternate picking 2 notes per string can feel strange at first as with any new speed lick or new concept, so as always start slow! We move down 4 positions of the D minor pentatonic scale, and end in a Bluesy phrase which mimics the backing track rhythm guitars once again before moving into our final lick.

Lick 13: Final Paul Gilbert style alternate picking sequence

This lick is very similar to the alternate picking lick we encountered in lick 5, if you are familiar with the picking sequence in lick 5, then this lick should come fairly easy with a bit of practice. Once again we are using strict alternate picking and 3 note per string patterns however this time we are taking notes from the D Aeolian scale, otherwise known as the D natural minor scale: D, E, F, G, A, Bb, and C. The picking sequence can be seen as a 12 note phrase which is moved up through the scale, when practicing the initial movements for this lick I would recommend splitting up the first 12 note pattern of this lick into two 6 note patterns. Check the tab to see what I mean. Once you have the initial 12 note sequence down, the rest of the lick should come fairly quickly. This lick is used as a device to get back up the fretboard to the final note of D on the G string 19th fret, the speed and ascending motion of the lick alongside the building of the backing track creates a real climax at the end of this solo. Speedy licks are great for building tension if used in the right places!

So that brings us to the end of this tech session on Mark Tremonti, hopefully the licks outlined in this session should give you plenty of neat ideas for creating your own speed licks, melodic phrases and ways of structuring solos for your own songs. Be sure to take all of these ideas slow at first, make sure that you can really hear the rhythm in each lick before trying to play it up to speed, rhythm is a very important aspect of soloing and sometimes it can easily be overlooked. Good luck and have fun with these Mark Tremonti style licks!